Basically, any male character--whatever his canonical orientation--could be interpreted that way. And that's the problem. It would shift the focus of FemGen away from stories about the women and how they see themselves and the world to stories about the canonically male characters and how they see women and see themselves."

Pregnancy and childbirth: "When I founded this ficathon in 2005 (has it been that long already?), canonical women in fanfiction were, then as now, often reduced to nothing but traditional gender roles and gender stereotypes. It bothered me that so many fanficcers--many of them women and girls--focused on traditional roles to the exclusion of all else. I created FemGen to get fanfic writers thinking about the active and heroic roles women could take, both in fanfic and in real life. I want to get people thinking outside the box of tradition."

Authorial avatars: "Since you are going to be writing about women and girls, I urge you to make them believable. Do not turn them into Mary Sues.

For the purposes of this ficathon, I am defining 'Mary Sue' as 'authorial stand-in who possesses many, if not all, characteristics that the writer wants to possess--good looks, intelligence, "attitude," "coolness," wealth, noble or royal blood, special toys that no one else has, the love of all canon characters, the love and desire of the author's lust object(s), special powers that may or may not be canonically possible, a Destiny--and a remarkable talent to send all canon characters OOC and to kill the plot.'

Despite some people's discomfort with the mod's limitations on what can be included in fics written for Femgenficathon, it remains a popular event for fans eager to see more positive portrayals of female characters in fandom.